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Virginia Regent
Human female, born LY 870, in Plist. Third Protestant Arch-bishop (903-?) Virginia became one of her church's junior spirit-talkers in 889, at age 19. In 898, she became the church's vice-bishop. Even before her promotion, she had been friendly with spirit-talkers from the churches of other districts in Plist, including Therman (who'd been vice-bishop of a neighboring district, when they first met, and became bishop of Plist five years before Virginia became a vice-bishop, herself). It was after becoming a vice-bishop in 898, however, that Virginia first accompanied Bishop Therman on the annual Pilgrimage to Monab. Coincidentally, it was that year that Kizin revealed the existence of The Plan to spirit-talkers from around the world. Therman was greatly troubled by this revelation, and would discuss his concerns with many of the spirit-talkers from Plist over the next few years, including Virginia. When Therman broke from The Order to found the Protestant Movement in 902, Virginia was among the spirit-talkers who joined him as a Protestant, even though she was always somewhat disturbed by the idea of rejecting the Order. In spite of her mixed feelings, when Therman became the first Protestant Arch-bishop, he named her Protestant bishop of Plist, a position that proved difficult for her, throughout the ensuing war. She was especially nervous because during that time, Therman did a great deal of traveling around the world, and so she had little contact with him, and little guidance. While she had no direct involvement in the war itself, in those days the newly established Protestant church was often targeted by those loyal to the Order, even if there was little serious physical violence. In spite of all this, her fellow Protestants believed she did a highly commendable job under difficult circumstances and great stress. In 903, Therman was killed in the war, and Virginia was one of the names mentioned to possibly succeed him as Protestant Arch-bishop. However, she was still getting a handle on being bishop, and refused to even consider being considered. The other two most popular candidates were Toros and Drag, the latter of whom ultimately received the position. However, later that same year, Toros died and Drag disappeared (along with all the Protestant Sorreters). At that point, Virginia felt it was her duty to accept the position of Protestant Arch-bishop, which not only the Protestants of her own village but those of a few other villages, where Therman had spoken well of her to those he converted to Protestantism, insisted she accept the nomination. (She was replaced as Plist's Protestant bishop by Christina Brushmaker.) If Virginia was reluctant in her new job at first, in the years since then she has proven herself quite capable (even if she herself insists that's only because most of her tenure has been during peacetime). When the surname law was passed in 904, Virginia chose the name "Regent," in order to indicate that she still considerd Drag to be the true Protestant Arch-bishop, while she merely acted in his stead, hoping he might someday return. However, in 912 (shortly before the Chaos War), she was contacted by Drag himself (via t-mail), to thank her for her service, and inform her that he has no intention of ever returning, even though many Protestant ex-Sorreters have ventured out into the world. And so she finally accepted that the position was genuinely hers. See also *List of Arch-bishops Category:People